Home | Songs By Year | Songs from 1983
The Fletcher Memorial Home
Buy The Fletcher Memorial Home now from AmazonFirst, read the Wikipedia article. Then, scroll down to see what other TopShelfReviews readers thought about the song. And once you've experienced the song, tell everyone what you thought about it.
Wikipedia article
"'The Fletcher Memorial Home'" is a song by Roger Waters, performed by Pink Floyd. The song appears on their 1983 album, 'The Final Cut'. It is the eighth track on the album and is arranged between "Get Your Filthy Hands Off My Desert" and "Southampton Dock". The song is also featured on the Pink Floyd compilations 'Echoes: The Best of Pink Floyd' and 'A Foot in the Door The Best of Pink Floyd'.
History
The song is about Waters' frustration with the leadership of the world since World War II, mentioning many world leaders by name (Ronald Reagan, Alexander Haig, Menachem Begin, Margaret Thatcher, Ian Paisley, Leonid Brezhnev, Joseph McCarthy and Richard Nixon), suggesting that these '"colonial wasters of life and limb"' be segregated into a specially-founded retirement home. It labels all the world leaders as "overgrown infants" and "incurable tyrants" and suggests they are incapable of understanding anything other than violence or their own faces on a television screen.
In its concluding lines, the narrator of the song gathers all of the "tyrants" inside the Fletcher Memorial Home and imagines applying "the Final Solution" to them.
'Fletcher' in the name of the song is in honour and remembrance of Roger Waters' father, Eric Fletcher Waters, who was killed during the Second World War at Anzio.
The Fletcher Memorial Home scenes in 'The Final Cut' film were filmed at Forty Hall in Enfield.
Reception
In a review for 'The Final Cut', Patrick Schabe of 'PopMatters' described "The Fletcher Memorial Home" as "majestic, but clunky".
Personnel
* Roger Waters vocals, bass guitar
* David Gilmour guitar
* Nick Mason drums
with:
* The National Philharmonic Orchestra conducted and arranged by Michael Kamen
* Michael Kamen piano
See also
*Ronald Reagan in music
References
Category:1983 songs
Category:Pink Floyd songs
Category:Anti-war songs
Category:Protest songs
Category:Songs written by Roger Waters
Category:Song recordings produced by Roger Waters
Category:Songs about politicians
Category:British hard rock songs
he:The Fletcher Memorial Home
Buy The Fletcher Memorial Home now from Amazon
<-- Return to songs from 1983